


Throwback in #007EFF

by MasteroftheCrypticArts



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 9/11 Terrorist Attacks Reference, Canonical Character Death, Drowning, Nightmares, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 15:30:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17226614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MasteroftheCrypticArts/pseuds/MasteroftheCrypticArts
Summary: Stephen dreams that his younger sister, Donna, is alive in the present year (2018) and catches her up on things she’s missed over the past two and a half decades. One of which is 9/11.





	Throwback in #007EFF

A yawning Stephen Strange went straight for the coffee machine after rolling out of bed. He didn’t notice the young lady sitting at his breakfast table. He stood, zombified, with his back to her while she fiddled with something. His tired eyes blinked miserably as they awaited a full cup. When he put in his creamer and sweetener, he turned away from the counter. Taking a long sip, he wasn’t surprised at all to see that he had an unannounced guest in his home: a teenager.   
  
“Morning, Steve.”   
  
“Mornin’, Donnie…”   
  
“I told you not to call me that. Or do you want me to start calling you _Petty Peeve_ again?”   
  
“Sorry.”   
  
Donna Strange smirked as Stephen approached the table and took a seat across from her. She reached over snubbed his nose with her fingers. He batted her off with a backhand and her smile widened. Stephen wanted to be mad, but he couldn’t stop his own smile from rising too.   
  
She was plain but pretty. Her thick, wavy brown hair was held up messily with a scrunchie, save for her wispy bangs. She wore a white tee with a denim vest over it. A high-waisted tartan miniskirt wrapped around her legs, and knee-high socks crawled up from her Mary Janes. She looked as if the world stopped spinning in the mid-nineties.   
  
“So, _big brother_ ,” Donna said coyly, “what’d I miss?”   
  
“A lot. Too much.”   
  
“No _duh_. Be specific. Have they invented flying cars yet? Are we colonizing the moon? Do people wear funny clothes out in public like when Marty McFly went to the future? Who’s the president?”   
  
“We haven’t gotten to flying cars, but we do have ones that you can plug in and recharge. We’re far from colonizing the moon. Some people do, but nothing too tacky or crazy like that. Mostly. Uh, …Donald Trump.”   
  
“ _What?_ ”   
  
“You’re really surprised after living through Reagan?”   
  
“Steve, I was four years old! You were six! You’re really telling me Trump is the face of our country now?”   
  
“If you think _President Trump_ is shocking, strap yourself in for this. The guy before him was black.”   
  
Donna’s eyes went wide.   
  
“Well, shit… I never thought I’d see the day.”   
  
Stephen only stared. Her eyes were just as blue as his own. Donna blinked and sat back in her chair, chewing on this. “Good for him,” she said.   
  
“Trump?”   
  
“The black guy.”   
  
“Obama.”   
  
“Huh?”   
  
“Barack Obama.”   
  
“Republican or Democrat?”   
  
“Democrat.”   
  
“And Trump?”   
  
“Republican.”   
  
“…I can’t say I’m surprised after all.”   
  
“Our political climate is a real shit show right now.”   
  
“When has it ever not been?”   
  
“True...”   
  
Stephen’s line of sight drifted from the window beside them, out to the western horizon. The sun was setting, casting the entire urban landscape in an orange-gold filter, but he didn’t notice the time discrepancy presented by this phenomenon. “The Twin Towers are gone.”   
  
“The Twin Towers? _Our_ Twin Towers?”   
  
“Yeah.”   
  
“Since when?”   
  
“2001. September 11. Terrorist attack. The Pentagon took a hit too. A fourth plane was flying towards D.C. but it crash-landed in a field in Pennsylvania.”   
  
“Planes? Commercial planes?”   
  
Stephen hesitated. Donna covered her mouth.   
  
“A lot of people died that day,” he said.   
  
“Oh my god…”   
  
She hid her face in her hands. Stephen still had his eyes set on the “Freedom Tower,” about two miles southwest from his luxurious loft. It twinkled in the early evening light magnificently. He always saw that skyscraper as a big, shiny middle finger. A bird superfluously flipped.   
  
Stephen and Donna went walking at the southern tip of Manhattan. They found themselves at the foot of the structure Stephen had just been gazing at. He told his sister about the One World Trade Center and then they walked over to Ground Zero, where Donna saw the memorial fountains for the first time: deep, gaping pits of black granite, where the foundations of each building were once laid. Donna’s hands brushed over a swath of the names that were carved into the monument’s parapet.   
  
“Imagine being one of the thousands of construction workers who built these buildings,” she mused. “Imagine putting your blood, sweat, and tears into them, only for them to come crashing down not even a century later…”   
  
Stephen had never given those people—long deceased—any thought. They would never know what became of their creations. It never mattered that they never would.   
  
“People must’ve _died_ to erect these buildings—”   
  
“Just like people must’ve died to build the Great Wall of China,” Stephen interrupted. “Or the pyramids of Giza.”   
  
Donna stopped. They watched the silvery sheets of water in silence.   
  
Inside the 9/11 Memorial Museum, just across the street from Ground Zero, Stephen stood with his sister on a bench. Before them, was the mosaic mural _Trying to Remember the Color of the Sky on That September Morning_. Amidst the thousands of watercolor squares rested a Virgilian quote from the _Aeneid_ : “No day shall erase you from the memory of time.” While Stephen looked at the mural, Donna held his hand. Neither of them noticed that they were the only people occupying the spacious room.   
  
“I had just begun my residency at New York Presbyterian,” he told her, finally sparing her a glance. “You can’t imagine the chaos... This infernal city has a track record of villainous people terrorizing it, yes, but _that_ … that was something completely else.”   
  
“Are you okay?” Her question confused him. It seemed to divert from the natural course of the conversation, but he didn’t have the strength of clarity to redirect it. “I don’t know how long it’s been,” Donna continued, “but—are you okay? Did you come out of it okay…?”   
  
Stephen reflected.   
  
“Peachy,” he finally said. Then, “More or less.”   
  
“When you go through something like that, it can have a profound effect on y—"   
  
“Don’t feed me any lines about occupational trauma.”   
  
“Stop it, Stephen. Don’t you do that. Not to me—”   
  
“Do what?”   
  
“Open up about a difficult experience and then pull some take-backsie bullshit the second someone offers you an ear. It’s a bad habit you have.”   
  
“I know you wanted to go to school to become a shrink, but that doesn’t mean you can start _armchair-diagnosing me_ from beyond the grave, _especially if you’re unqualified_ —”   
  
“I don’t need to be qualified to see that you’ve been traumatized—”   
  
“YOU NEED TO BE _ALIVE_ TO SEE THAT.”   
  
Stephen shuddered. His vocal chords were tight and tears sprinted down his face. Donna looked horrified. Probably because she hadn’t once seen her big brother cry while she lived. Not once. He couldn’t keep looking at her and his head dropped between his shoulders.   
  
“…Stephen, please,” Donna begged. “ _Please_ talk to me. I’m here for you. I’ll always be here for you.”   
  
Stephen groaned—a raw, pained sound that morphed into anger—and he lashed up.   
  
“I DON’T NEED YOUR CHARITY!”   
  
After the words left his mouth, he saw Donna’s hurt, gentle face transform. It looked just the way it used to when she was furious: soft, girlish lines turned hard with serrated edges.   
  
“ _Charity…?_ Is giving a mere _fuck_ about my own big brother an act of _charity?_ No! Charity is something you give to complete strangers who you pity free of charge. I do _not_ pity you. If I pity either one of us, I PITY _ME!_ ME. A girl with big dreams, a bright future, all undercut by a fucking MUSCLE CRAMP. MY LIFE WAS TRASHED BECAUSE OF THAT AND BECAUSE OF A NEGLIGENT OLDER BROTHER WHO DIDN’T HEAR ME CALLING FOR HELP WHILE I WAS DYING.”   
  
Stephen’s bones felt like metal pipes struck against concrete. Donna got close to his face. She grabbed his upper arm and her nails gouged into his jacket.   
  
“Don’t you _dare_ presume that I’m giving you charity, Stephen Vincent Strange. _Even if you were a stranger to me, I would NEVER, **EVER GIVE YOU MY CHARITY!**_ ”   
  
Stephen snapped awake from his nightmare and the soaked feeling of sweat erupted over his body. His stomach was roiling hot and he shoved the blankets away. He stared up at the ceiling in the darkness of his bedroom. He focused as hard as he could on keeping the contents of his stomach where they belonged. Deep, controlled breaths swelled and deflated his chest. In… and out—a discomfited sigh scratched against his vocal chords—a whimper.   
  
The ceiling shrank from him and he saw into a deep, square basin with slanted walls. As water streamed in silvery sheets from the natural contours of his bedroom, spilling up, patches of tiles appeared and spread along its floor. They shimmered, coming together in a spectrum of bright, cerulean hues, creeping up the sides until abraded by stubborn black granite. The memorial fountain’s water rose and Stephen began to hyperventilate as it descended towards him in a steady wall of churning ripples. From the depths of the pool, a body, clad in swimwear, surfaced. His stomach lurched and he sucked in a strangulated breath. A hand clapped over his mouth. A cry slipped through his palm.   
  
There she was. Doing the Dead Man’s Float.


End file.
